Fucking Daphne Read online

  Over the next several months, I’d return to the cemetery almost every day. My mother and brother thought I needed to see my dad’s tombstone again and again just to remind myself that it was real and that he was actually gone. But I was looking for the dog. I hoped I’d find him up there, napping lazily near my dad’s grave, waiting for me to come back. Sometimes I’d wait for hours, jumping every time I heard a twig snap, gasping when any forest creature happened to catch my eye. When he never showed up, I tried to convince myself that there wasn’t anything magical about the dog after all. But that didn’t stop me from looking, and waiting, and hoping against hope that he wasn’t gone forever.

  And then one day, I arrived at the cemetery and saw Daphne waiting for me. She was sitting on my dad’s gravestone, smoking a cigarette and looking absolutely stunning in her newly dreadlocked hair and black baby-doll dress.

  “Sorry about your dad,” she said. But it wasn’t in a pitying way. It was in a casual, indifferent, “them’s the breaks” kind of way. It was nice. I’d become accustomed to people treating me like porcelain, terrified that I might break if they didn’t handle me with a delicate touch.

  “Yeah,” I said, not knowing what else to say. “It sucks.”

  She crushed the cigarette on her boot heel and threw it into some nearby crabgrass. “My mom died, too,” she said, almost in a monotone.

  I just nodded. We both looked at each other, enjoying the silence and the mutual understanding that the last thing either of us needed was to be comforted.

  “I think my dad came back as a dog,” I said finally. “I don’t know if he’s been reincarnated or what, but I’m pretty sure it’s him.”

  I regretted it the moment the words left my mouth. It sounded so silly and sentimental and, well, more than a little crazy. I half-expected her to start laughing or screaming—maybe a little of both. And then she’d call me a freak and run out of the cemetery and that’d be the last time I ever heard from her.

  But she didn’t. She just sat there and smiled at me.

  “You think he’s still here?” she asked, with genuine curiosity.

  I just shrugged. “I dunno,” I said. “Maybe.”

  She slid off the gravestone and took my hand. “Well,” she said, “let’s go find him.”

  We spent the rest of the afternoon looking for my dad. We searched the graveyard and the forest preserve nearby, calling out his name and offering him bits of bacon if he’d come out of hiding. She told me about her mom and I just listened. And then I told her about my dad, and she smiled and squeezed my hand more tightly. The sun began to set and we still hadn’t found him, but somehow I didn’t care anymore. The hard clump in my chest had vanished.

  We went back to her house and hung out in her bedroom for most of the night. If she had a father or siblings, we never saw them, and she never mentioned where they might be. We listened to her bootleg tapes of the Replacements and the Pixies and lay together on her bed, staring at the ceiling and talking about nothing of any real importance. She showed me her tattoos, and told me about the other tattoos she wanted to get soon. She ran her fingers through my hair and told me I’d look a lot cooler if I let it grow out a few more inches. And then, before I realized what was happening, we were naked and making love.

  Actually, that’s not entirely true. Some of what we did was definitely lovemaking, but some of it was just fucking. Our first time was very relaxed and romantic. It was all gentle kisses and soft touching, and she didn’t seem to mind that I had no idea what the hell I was doing. But round two was an altogether different story. Once I’d learned the ropes, she apparently decided that it was time to put me through my paces and see what I could do. Before long, I was well versed in fetishes like spanking, hair-pulling, filthy talk, light bondage, and even biting. The biting part in particular caught me off guard. To be fair, she gave me plenty of advance warning, but I didn’t think she was serious until I felt her teeth sink into my shoulder.

  “I’m sorry, sweetie,” she said, wiping away the blood with her forearm. “I didn’t mean to break the skin. I just got a little carried away.”

  “It’s okay,” I laughed. And weirdly, I meant it.

  If I could have, I would have stayed with her in that bedroom forever. Even though she’d taken a chunk out of my shoulder blade, I felt safe with her. But more than that, she made me feel like an adult. Not because she was the first woman who let me touch her private bits. Something about being next to her made it okay that my dad had died and my world had fallen apart. None of it seemed like such a catastrophe anymore. It was just another part of being alive.

  When she held on to me, without ever saying anything that sounded like condescending sympathy, I knew that I was strong and fearless and nothing could touch me again. I wasn’t a kid who cried over his dead daddy and hid alone in his bedroom. I was the kind of guy who stayed up all night with his punk rock girlfriend and listened to badass music and smoked cigarettes and talked about tattoos and did incredibly dirty things with the lights still on.

  “We are the sons of no oooone,” we sang along with the ’Mats, our naked and sweaty bodies still intertwined. “Bastards of the yooooooung!”

  Daphne was laughing so hard, I worried for a minute that I’d done something wrong.

  “I don’t fucking believe this!” she shrieked. “This is the most fucked-up, freaky-ass thing I’ve ever done in my life.”

  I tried to pass my cigarette to her, but she waved it away. We were both naked and huddled under my jacket, leaning against the same tombstone that, just seconds ago, had been an unwitting participant in some truly staggering orgasms. We were, if you’ll excuse the pun, loud enough to wake the dead.

  I’m not sure if you’ve ever tried to enjoy some postcoital snuggling in a graveyard, but I don’t recommend it. The grass has a way of getting into crevices that isn’t exactly comfortable.

  “You’re kidding me,” I said. “This is the first time you’ve had sex in a cemetery? Hmm. That’s surprising.”

  She punched me playfully. “What are you saying?” She howled in mock protest. “I look like somebody who does this sort of thing all the time?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “Punk rock hairdo, tattoos, black leather boots. Seems like the uniform of a graveyard fucker to me.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Whatever. Looks can be deceiving.”

  She snatched away my cigarette and took a long, thoughtful drag. “And if you’ll remember, you’re the one who talked me into this,” she said.

  “Yeah, but you didn’t exactly put up much resistance,” I said, teasing her. “Do you make a habit of having raunchy sex in public places with complete strangers?”

  “Not really, no.” She exhaled a cloud of blue smoke into my face, and when I winced, she snuck a quick kiss. “But you seemed nice enough.”

  We sat in silence, just gazing at the stars and trying to enjoy the moment while it lasted. I wondered if this was the right time to bring it up. I would’ve preferred that she figure it out on her own, but at this point, it seemed unlikely.

  “I don’t know what it is about this particular graveyard,” I said finally. “It just has some warm memories for me.”

  She almost gagged on the cigarette. “I knew it! So I’m not the first girl you boinked in a cemetery. The truth comes out!”

  “No, no, no,” I said. “Nothing like that. It’s just . . . I knew this girl once. Back when I was in high school.”

  Her face went ashen. “Is she dead? Oh, please don’t tell me she’s buried here.”

  I laughed. “No, she’s still alive.” I paused and turned to look at her, with an expression I hoped appeared meaningful. “Very much alive, as it turns out.”

  She stared back at me, but her face indicated nothing, not even the faintest hint of recognition. Was she just toying with me? Did she know exactly who I was, but not want to be the first to admit it?

  “So what was she like?” she asked. “Tell me about your little teenage h
ottie.”

  “There’s not much to tell,” I said.

  “Oh, come on, what are you worried about?” She gave my arm a pinch. “Afraid I’ll be jealous?”

  Okay, I thought, let’s do this. If she wanted a Mexican standoff, I’d play along. “Well, actually,” I said, “she looked a lot like you.”

  “Ah, I get it now,” she sniffed. “So that’s why you came on so strong. You just wanted to fuck somebody who sorta resembled the long-lost girlfriend who got away, is that it?”

  “Well, I don’t know about that.” I swallowed hard. I didn’t like where this was heading. “I mean, it’s not like . . . “

  Her eyes narrowed. “Wait a minute; you didn’t honestly think that I was . . . “ She stopped. She didn’t need to say the words. She understood, probably better than I did.

  Panic washed over me. My eyes darted across Daphne’s face, looking for something that would confirm my suspicions. A mole, a piercing, anything that would provide conclusive proof that she was who I thought she was. And it occurred to me that I didn’t really know why I believed she looked like my ex-girlfriend. I scoured my brain, trying to conjure up a mental image of Daphne. But it had been twenty years since I’d seen her; she was just another out-of-focus memory. Now that I thought about it, I wasn’t even sure anymore if her name really had been Daphne.

  Daphne—or whoever the hell she was—had disappeared from my life as quickly as she’d walked into it. After all, we dated for only a few months before she gradually stopped calling. We’d see each other only at parties or social gatherings. She never told me why she’d lost all interest in me. She just faded into the background, until one morning I woke up and realized she was gone for good. It broke my heart, but I didn’t know what to do or how to win her back. I thought changing my appearance might change her mind. I wore thrift store clothes and grew a mustache and dyed my hair black. But none of it worked. Especially the mustache (that was just a bad, bad idea). Then we graduated and she moved, and I never saw her again.

  When I’d spotted Daphne in the bar that night, maybe I’d just thought she was what my ex-girlfriend would look like, or should look like, as an adult. But what was I basing that on? Her tattoos? Her dreadlocks? The fact that she thought it was a terrific idea to have sex in a graveyard with a guy she’d just met? What did that prove, really? How many times had I seen women who looked just like her without my jumping to the same conclusion?

  The tattoos! That was it! My Daphne, or whatever her real name was, had a tattoo on her lower back; a pyramid-shaped thing with wings. I must’ve seen a tattoo on this Daphne’s back that looked eerily similar. I just had to ask Daphne to turn around, and if I was right and she really did have the same tattoo, then I’d know I had the same woman.

  But what if the tattoo wasn’t there? What if I’d just imagined it? Did I really want to find out that I’d been wrong—that this Daphne, the adult Daphne, wasn’t the same Daphne from my past? Maybe the Daphne I still loved and wanted back more than anything in the world didn’t exist anymore, at least not as I remembered her. Was I willing to take the chance that my carefully constructed house of cards might tumble right in front of me?

  No, I thought, the tattoo is there. No need to do anything. I know it’s there. I saw it.

  “So, funny story,” I said, quickly changing the subject. “My dad is buried in this cemetery.”

  Daphne very nearly did a double take. “He’s what?”

  “Yeah, right over there.” I pointed toward a tombstone a short distance away.

  Daphne pulled my jacket more tightly around her naked body. “Oh, Jesus, this is so fucking embarrassing. You really are a sick fuck, aren’t you?”

  There was something about her sudden bashfulness that I found completely adorable. “What are you worried about?” I laughed. “I don’t think he’s actually here.”

  “You don’t know that,” she snarled. “We’re in a goddamn graveyard. There are spirits wandering all over this place.”

  “So you don’t care about strange ghosts leering at you,” I asked tenderly, “just so long as one of them isn’t my dad?”

  “Yeah, something like that.”

  “That is the cutest thing I’ve ever heard in my life,” I said.

  I saw that the coat had slipped off her shoulder, and I pulled it back up, tucking it behind her, before she could notice.

  “I suppose he could be here,” I continued, surveying the cemetery. I hesitated for a moment, not sure if I really wanted to tell her any of this. “I, uh . . . ” I hesitated, choosing my words carefully. “Well, you’re going to think this is insane, but . . . I’m pretty sure he was reincarnated as a dog.”

  She said nothing, just stared out into the dark. I couldn’t tell if she was listening or just planning the best way to make a hasty retreat.

  “I’ve only seen him once, in this cemetery. But that was a long, long time ago.”

  I told her everything. I told her how I’d come back to this place every day for almost a year, hoping that the dog would return eventually. I told her that it had never occurred to me what I might do if I ever caught up with him again. Did I intend to kidnap him? Throw him into the backseat of my car and take him home? And what then? Did I seriously think I could adopt my dead dad? And wouldn’t too much exposure to this dog just prove what I didn’t want to know—that he was just an ordinary dog, and that I’d been fooling myself all those years?

  What I really wanted, I told her, was a proper goodbye. If he’d done it once, he could do it again. And I’d get it right this time. I’d let him lick my face and comfort my mom, and I’d tell him all the things I never got a chance to. I wanted my lasting memory of him to be something special, something that I could tell his grandkids about someday. I wanted . . .

  “Was he a beagle?” Daphne asked.

  “Excuse me?”

  “A beagle,” she repeated. “Was your dad reincarnated as a beagle?”

  She pointed toward the thicket of trees at the edge of the graveyard. And sure enough, there it was. Peeking out from behind a bush, watching us with big eyes that glowed in the darkness like a car’s taillights. It was a fucking beagle.

  “Holy shit!” I felt my balls shrink and retreat into my body. I wasn’t sure if I should scream or make a mad dash toward the dog.

  Daphne made the decision for me. “What are we waiting for?” she whispered, with a mischievous grin. “Let’s go get him.”

  She didn’t give me a chance to say no. She leapt off the ground and began running toward the beagle, which had already turned and fled into the forest. I chased after Daphne, and in spite of myself I burst into laughter. There was something so utterly ridiculous about this, about two completely naked people running through the woods in hot pursuit of a dog who may or may not have been possessed by the soul of a dead father.

  “Hey, Eric’s dad!” she yelled at the beagle. “Hold up! Where are you going? I just want to say hello!”

  I almost stumbled over my own feet, which just made me laugh harder. Even Daphne was giggling, though it wasn’t enough to make her slow down. We laughed and ran and laughed and ran, and somewhere in the back of my mind I wondered if Daphne and I were chasing the same thing.

  “Just give me one more chance,” I muttered, though I wasn’t sure if I was saying it to my dad or to Daphne. “That’s all I want. One more chance. Just one more. One more. One more.”

  SCHOOL BUS

  Gabe Scelta

  Before my first day of eighth grade, I always sat next to Jim or Charlie on the bus. That year, though, there was a new bus route and the bus driver assigned our seats. When we pulled up in front of a big whitewashed house, a girl got on. She was pretty in that feminine way that I never tried to be, all long hair and eyelashes. She was new but I could see right away that she was going to be one of the popular ones, those pretty white girls whose moms waited for them in the driveway at precisely 3:18 PM. The bus driver sat the new girl next to me, since we were in the sa
me class. I was worried that sitting next to a girl would mean that we would have to talk about boys and hair and stuff. Of course, I was a girl then, too, just not that kind.

  We were shy that first day, and talking more took a while. I thought she was in such a different league. She was pretty and proper. I would watch her from the other end of the long cafeteria table, eating those school lunch pizzas, rectangular with two perfectly centered pieces of pepperoni whose edges curve up into oily little meat bowls on top of the single slab of cheese. She ate hers with a fork and knife. I thought that was ridiculous, and her propriety scared me. I gobbled and snarled at my food, chewing and talking and occasionally sticking my tongue out to show the younger kids my half-chewed lunch. When I saw her cut hers into neat, bite-size triangles, I suddenly felt like a Neanderthal.

  One day I was behind her in the lunch line and noticed when the lady with the hairnet and putrid green medical shirt rang her up. The lady ticked off the name Gottlieb on her sheet of paper and took a single quarter sweetly from her hand, just like she did for me. Both of us had subsidized lunches. Daphne was poor, too. Why was she pretending? She saw me pay for mine.

  After the ride home that afternoon, we didn’t pretend with each other anymore. It was understood, though, that once we were on school grounds, usually as soon as the bus doors opened, she’d be gone again, pretending. She’d disappear into the tightly protected circle of popular girls to talk about which of the popular boys were the cutest and Where did you get that sweater? and Oh, how I wish my hair were naturally curly!

  Once I started watching how she was with them, I understood. She explained to me that she was always scared of looking like trash, because that’s what we were. That’s why we were on the bus together in the first place, bused in from the poor town forty minutes away. It was safer for her to smile and agree and fade into the background without letting them know too much. She was almost . . . undercover.